Blizzard Leisure has laid out plans to start testing for the potential return of 6v6 matchups in Overwatch 2…finally.
The replace on the controversy plaguing the Overwatch group comes from recreation director Aaron Keller, who posted a 3600-word Director’s Take blog post on the topic in the present day. It’s a prolonged assertion on the historical past of 6v6, why it was eliminated with the launch of Overwatch 2, and the way Blizzard plans to experiment with the mode as soon as once more. That’s proper – the staff is thinking about bringing again the 12-player choice practically two years after it was swapped out for the faster-paced 5v5 mode.
“The group has, juuuust a couple of times, urged a take a look at,” Keller says. “Why not put numerous types of 6v6 within the recreation so as to gauge the outcomes? We agree, and based mostly in your suggestions, we’re exploring how we will take a look at totally different types of 6v6 within the recreation to gauge the outcomes.”
Keller says that whereas the staff stays centered on ironing out 5v5, it can also be “wanting at operating a sequence of occasions to check out totally different core staff composition codecs in Overwatch 2.” Even the smallest signal of 6v6 is sufficient to reignite curiosity in gamers who’ve begged for its return, however implementing these exams shouldn’t be so simple as simply flipping a swap. Technological challenges introduced by 12-player lobbies is among the largest hurdles to overcome. The sport director explains that, whereas the staff is investigating a everlasting efficiency improve throughout all platforms, it’s a “massive effort that might more than likely take at least a number of seasons to accomplish.” There’s additionally the problem of queue occasions, which may be probably inflated throughout your entire Overwatch 2 expertise ought to one thing like 6v6 stick round.
Irrespective of how badly some gamers need 6v6 again, alterations to the Overwatch 2 formulation current new challenges to overcome. Although Keller says a brand new iteration of Fast Play: Hacked will experiment with staff meeting at some level throughout Season 13, it’s not precisely clear when official testing will start. He cautions that this proposed reintroduction of 6v6 will be an extended course of and that in the present day’s publish is just the “begin of this dialog.”
“We’d run the take a look at for just a few weeks and gauge curiosity from the group,” Keller explains when talking on the advantage of the exams. “Then we’d measure the impression it had on the opposite experiences in Overwatch 2, like 5v5, Arcade, and many others. We’d take the teachings from this playtest to see what we will study concerning the mode inside the present recreation ecosystem and for the way forward for Overwatch. We’d mirror fastidiously on the learnings from no matter take a look at we run and discover how to finest give gamers what’s being requested for. Whether or not that’s a world of 5v5, 6v6 and even each, is for future us to determine.”
Let’s break it down
Overwatch launched in 2016 and has since slowly advanced into a wholly totally different beast. As Blizzard has labored to set up truthful and enjoyable recreation environments, it has added, gutted, and altered all kinds of recreation modes. As famous by Keller, these modifications embrace stricter Hero limits in Fast Play, the addition of the extra inflexible mode referred to as Position Queue, and naturally, the swap to 5v5.
The unique Overwatch used the 6v6 format as its go-to construction till your entire expertise was changed with Overwatch 2 in 2022. This free-to-play sequel swapped in 5v5 matches, with Blizzard’s reasoning at the time being that it would cut back battlefield litter and lead to a cleaner, extra fulfilling expertise for all three roles – Tank, Injury, and Help. Keller stands by the choice, saying that 5v5 is “extra cognitively manageable” than the 6v6 matchups. It additionally led to drastically shorter queue occasions in Position Queue, particularly for individuals who queued up to play Injury Heroes.
Keller acknowledges that 6v6 nonetheless has its upsides, and the choice to take away it was not made frivolously. Nonetheless, there are those that desire the unique format to at the present time and have even campaigned for its return. Requires Blizzard to embrace a 6v6 choice reached a boiling level the previous few months, with many gamers complaining that 5v5 is extra punishing on a person stage, particularly when queueing up to play Tank. With tensions within the Overwatch group rising, Blizzard has lastly stepped in.
Keller has been teasing plans to offer more insight into Blizzard’s point of view for several weeks, and in the present day’s publish possible goes into extra element than many have been anticipating. Nonetheless, because the director talked about, the studio has numerous work and listening to do earlier than staff composition exams start, and even then, it’s unclear if these experiments will yield the outcomes its group wishes.
In the meantime, Overwatch 2 is barreling towards the tip of Season 11 of its post-launch roadmap. Whereas particulars on how Season 12 will up the ante principally stay a thriller, the studio did simply wrap up a weekend playtest for its new Help Hero, Juno, an agile space-themed competitor with attention-grabbing ties to the Overwatch universe. This newest addition to the roster will return as a completely playable character when Season 12 launches subsequent month.
Michael Cripe is a contract contributor with IGN. He began writing within the business in 2017 and is finest recognized for his work at retailers reminiscent of The Pitch, The Escapist, OnlySP, and Gameranx.
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